


Totem

by 11_Gadget_27



Series: Mercenary!AU [2]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Little bit of Fluff, M/M, Mentions of Character Death, Small mention of blood, little bit of grief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:34:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26568133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/11_Gadget_27/pseuds/11_Gadget_27
Summary: A glimpse of Mav's softer side, how he's handling the deaths of his friends and the observation of turian death rituals.
Series: Mercenary!AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1932319
Comments: 2





	Totem

Mav’s mandibles worked against his jaw in a haphazard dance of regret and misery. Ailuros looked up at him from the photo, his eyes bright and his mandibles spread in a genuine smile. He’d only seen that smile a handful of times in the all too short while he’d known him. And Baast, in the photo too, his smile more aloof but just as real… Mav cleared his throat, shifting a little on the couch. He needed to wipe his eyes but he couldn’t put the picture down, his fingers wouldn’t let go. He sat like that for a long time. **  
**

Baast had always pet his fringe too roughly. Dragging his hands across it like trying to pull on the spines and scraping his nails down the length of them to force his head back. They’d talked about it, Mav liked some rough play but that wasn’t how you handled a man’s fringe. Baast got more gentle with that part of him over time. The rest of him though… the drell had been perfect at leaving him feeling undone, wrecked and shaking in the aftermath of a night together. But that aloof little smile of his when he was pleased with his work, with the result of his efforts, Mav would remember him for that. He’d strike the image of a slumped body in a bloody hallway from his memory and just remember that smile.

_The flat edge of teeth showed past his lips, just a little sliver of white. “What’re you grinnin’ at?” Mav slurred, relaxed on the bed to the point of melted on it, into it. Spirits, all his muscles were trembling and Baast was looking at him like a hungry varren with a cornered pyjack._

He still hadn’t put the picture down, staring down into deep, dark eyes. What did drell do for those that had died? What was their death ritual? Mav recalled something about the sea and wondered how long it would take to get to Kahje from Palaven. He wondered if Palavenian pine would be a disrespectful material, if he should try to get his hands on some driftwood or sea glass. Never mind that he had no idea how to carve and shape sea glass, he had only ever made totems from pine, but he’d learn. He owed Baast a lot.

_The turian youth was sand colored with pale violet eyes and an easy smile that didn’t quite reach them. He hovered next to Baast, trying to look confident and cool but Mav could see the ever so slight nervous flicker of his mandibles. “This is Ailuros. You be nice to him, Mav and he’ll be nice to you.”_

Mav remembered that nervousness only lasting a few moments after Baast had left them alone. But it had been the drell, his serious way, that had made the boy uncomfortable and the two of them had worked that out in the long run. He and Ailuros had hit off and for the first time in a long time, Mav had found someone he would readily call a friend. Sex had come later that day because of course it had, but intimacy had followed close behind.

_He could hear the purr from the bathroom while he cleaned up and wet a cloth. “You’re so loud, baby.” He teased the boy as he climbed back on the bed, wiping the mess from Ailuros’ belly and between his legs, so gentle with that warmly wet cloth. “I make you happy or somethin’?”_

_“Or somethin’.” The boy laughed, mimicking his accent almost perfectly, giving him that smile. “Lie back down, Mavi.You don’t have to leave yet.”_

_Mav threw the dirty cloth on the floor and curled up next to the boy, sliding an arm under him and tangling their legs together. “I wasn’t plannin’ to leave just yet.”_

_Ailuros put his head on his chest and snuggled close, his purr still so loud. “Good.”_

Palavenian pine was a hardwood, the bark silver with leaves so deep a blue to be nearly black and the smoke it produced when it burned was cobalt and smelled of rain. Mav wasn’t sure how that worked, botany had never been something that really interested him other than learning which plants not to nibble on or touch. He just knew totems for the dead were carved from Palavenian pine and always had been.

_“Ailuros,” His throat was too tight. Spirits… What they had done to the boy… “Baby, it’s me. It’s Mavi.”_

_“Mavi?”_

_Mav was afraid to touch him and he could see his hands shaking as he reached for Ailuros’ fringe to comfort him. Crassus was a solid presence at his back and he hoped the big guy didn’t hold this weakness against him. “Yeah, baby. You’re gonna be okay, yeah? All of you are. I’ll call some people and they’ll come take care of you all, make you feel better.”_

He didn’t want to think about those last few minutes of Ailuros’ life. The slow, methodical scrape of the short-bladed but sharp knife as he removed the bark dulled the memory of whimpers. The vague scent of rain drowned out the lingering smell of blood. Desolas had taught him how to shape the totems, which tools to use, how to hold them. The difference between a firm touch and a deft one and the results of both. Desolas had taught him the importance of tradition, of reverence and how grief eventually became a part of you. Mav’s hands had been too small for the tools, his understanding of the world too basic for the complex nuances of the lesson. He had been only seven when he’d carved his first totems. One for his mother and one for his father. Mav knew their faces from pictures, but their voices he couldn’t remember anymore. 

_“Have you been to Palaven before?” Ailuros asked, stretched out beside him and tracing a few of his scars as he rested his eyes._

_Mav purred absently, soaking up the attention in the aftermath of their session, his body cooling but the boy still warm against his side. “A few times,” He answered._

_“Is it as beautiful as everyone says?”_

_“Er…” He shifted a little and got stuck staring into those pretty eyes. “Yeah, I reckon it is. There’s a lotta folks livin’ there, a lotta cities and shit. Y’know, an actual planet with a real population. It’s real crowded.”_

_Ailuros followed a scar on his thigh with his finger tips. “You don’t like that? I’ve always wanted to live in a real city. Or on a planet. Just somewhere not a station, I guess.”_

_“I don’t dislike it,” Mav shrugged his shoulders a little. Palaven had never felt like home to him but he’d always yearned for a place he barely remembered. “My homeworld is small. In comparison, anyway. Open fields. Farms. Miles between homesteads. There’s still wild animals, y’know? I dream ‘bout it sometimes.”_

_The boy rolled onto his chest and let their heads rest close together, not quite touching but close. Mav had angle himself a little to see him clearly. “Where’s home?”_

_“Just some planet,” He shrugged again. He couldn’t say the name here, you never knew who might be listening._

_“Mavi,” The boy whined for more detail._

_Mav closed his eyes with a sigh. “There’s this little house on an old farm,” He said, wrapping his arms around the boy’s back and working a hand up to pet his fringe. “Just a couple of livestock left, my folks had sold almost all of them before the war broke out….” Ailuros was too young to understand all the damage Relay 314 had done, too young to remember a time when turians and humans hadn’t grudgingly worked together. “It had a wrap ‘round porch and a big side yard and this tree that reached in every direction. We had flowers that bloomed in the winter that looked like ice sculptures. You could see the stars the moment the sun set…” He stared into those pretty violet eyes as he described his home. “I’d like to take you there.”_

The totem took shape beneath the knife and Mav would never call himself artistic, but it was actually starting to look a little like Ailuros. A few more details, a little sanding… He was happy with it even as he wiped under his eyes again and then wiped the dampness off on his pant leg. He’d never gotten the chance to show Ailuros Carthaan, that little farm house or the flowers that looked like ice. He hadn’t gone himself in too many years. His sparse apartment in Palaven’s capital was as much home as anywhere. Or Desolas’ house in the country and he should visit, shouldn’t he? There was so much for him and his adoptive father to talk about. So many more lessons.

_“What…is this?” Ailuros held the glass vial between two talons, turning it this way and that, the contents sloshing lazily inside._

_Mav ran a hand back over his fringe, mandibles flickering. “It’s water from my homeworld,” He said. “It’s special. I can’t explain, yeah? You just have to see for yourself.”_

_“Okay?” The boy gave him an odd look, head tilted._

_“Trust me, yeah?” He tested a smile, a real one, and moved to the light-switch. “Watch this. You’re gonna love it.”_

_He turned the light off and slowly, so slowly, the vial in Ailuros’ hand began to glow. The boy gasped and Mav smiled wider, coming over to sit with him on the couch._

_“Microscopic bioluminescent lichen,” He said, cupping Ailuros’ hand around the vial as the glow became more intense. “I thought… you weren’t willin’ to go with me, and that’s fine, yeah? So I figured I’d bring a lil’ to you.”_

Mav adjusted the chain around his neck, holding the vial reverently as he pulled on a clean shirt and then a jacket. It wasn’t that cold out but it was too cold for him while he healed from all Nival had done to him. And it was a long walk to Temple Palaven. He put the painted totem in a backpack he then slung over his shoulder. His omnitool was ringing and the tone told him who it was but the big guy would have to wait. Mav would call him back when he was done. 

There was a designated place for totems at the Temple and while Mav wasn’t the only one there with an offering for the Spirits, it was spacious enough that he felt alone. He placed the carved and painted totem into the divot of blackened stone and arranged a little bed of kindling at its base. Mav had stopped smoking while he recovered but he still carried a lighter and he used it now to ignite the kindling. The flame caught after a moment and he sat back on his knees, hands in his lap and watched the totem burn, the smoke stinging his eyes but he didn’t wipe the tears away.

_Ailuros watched him dress with that little smile and Mav stopped more than once to kiss him again. Then again and once more before the boy pushed him away with a little laugh. “I’m goin’, I’m goin’. Spirits, boy.” He chuckled. “I’ll see you in a week or two, yeah?”_

_“You better, Mavi.” His smile was so big and bright it lit up his eyes in such an alluring way that Mav had to kiss him a final time._

It was hours before embers turned to ashes and Mav rose to his feet again. “Spirits take you home, Ailuros.”


End file.
